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5-2019

Preying For A MiracleHannah Oakes

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Recommended CitationOakes, Hannah, "Preying For A Miracle" (2019). Undergraduate Honors Theses. Paper 512. https://dc.etsu.edu/honors/512

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Table of Contents

Acknowledgments……………………………………………………………… p3

Chapter I: Introduction……………………….………………………………… p4

Chapter II: Bad Painting…………………………………………….…………..p6

Chapter III: Process……………………………………………………………..p9

Chapter IV: Preying For A Miracle…………………………...……………… .p10

Chapter V: Head to Toe………………………………………………..……… p10

Chapter VI: Can You Hook It………………………………………...……….. p15

Chapter VII: Crux of the Matter…………………………………..………….. p18

Chapter VIII: Conclusion………………………………..…………………… p21

Bibliography……………………………………………………………………p22

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Acknowledgments

I would like to thank Mira Gerard for your encouragement and commitment to guiding

me through this process, James Rodriguez for your enthusiasm and willingness to teach, and

especially Christian Rieben, who has always been an exceptional critic and mentor.

Thank you Scott Contreras-Koterbay and Pat Cronin for investing in me since my

freshman year and instilling confidence in me since my first Artistic Vision class.

Thank you to Anabel Hadad and Haley Waters for being steady partners and friends. I am

so proud of you both and am forever thankful we got to walk this road together.

Thank you, Dad, Mom, Matt, and Ethan, for being my biggest fans. I’m so thankful for

your unwavering love and support.

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The thing I love about oil paint is how vulnerable it is. It is easily manipulated, it can be shoved

around with no trouble, and it can cover up anything that the artist no longer wants to see. We

can protect it, or we can completely disregard it.

When I begin my paintings, my favorite sight is that of the blank canvas. I know at this

stage of the process I will soon mark on the canvas, and it will never be able to return to its pure

state again. This same rule applies to fresh brushes, because they will always have color once

they meet the palette. Not only will they never be pure white again, but the bristles of the brushes

will never lay perfectly like they did before I introduce them to the textures of the canvas or

harass them to become the shape and width I desire. The significance in my process of painting

is the paint becomes something that can be manipulated, but never fully controlled. There is

something gloriously agonizing about this type of ‘beauty’ in relation to painting, because every

mark on the canvas is a fleeting moment that can either be frozen in time or lost for eternity.

At the very core of my identity as a painter I could summarize my work by saying I make

ugly paintings about ugly things. I’m using the word ‘ugly’ in a way that can best be understood

by examining the point of view of Marcia Tucker, a New York based critic and curator. Tucker

used the term ‘bad painting’ to lump together a new trend among American figurative painters in

the seventies that emerged as a response to movements such as the Minimalism and

Conceptualism. Minimalist work can be understood as geometric shapes and forms that are

lacking in any expression or décor. Artist Frank Stella was especially successful during this

movement.

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Zambezi, 1959. Enamel paint on canvas. 90 3/4 × 78 3/4 in. 230.5 × 200 cm. Fig 1

Stella’s created his series “The Black Paintings” when he moved to the New York art scene in

1958 and his particular technique and concept behind the work gained him a large amount of

recognition. Elizabeth Baker analyzes the work at this point in Stella’s career by saying, “These

paintings carry to some kind of illusion-prone ultimate the parallel-stripe vocabulary and also

refer back to the black works for their degree of relative complexity of sensation; and like the

physical unevenness of the blacks, the running Vs’ sullen metallic color has life to it.” (Baker 1)

His creation process is described as “penciling lines on blank canvases and going over them with

a roller and black house paint. He left thin strips of unpainted canvas to create the white lines

that we see”. Stella’s piece Zambezi (Fig 1) is one of the works from his The Black Paintings

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series where we can see these small white lines that uniformly lead us to the center of the canvas.

Equally as intriguing as the process of creation is his conceptual approach to the work he was

creating. In Stella’s eyes the components were what they were; materials cooperating on a

canvas.

Tucker’s Bad Painting exhibition was filled with artists who rejected the Minimalist

efforts for creating and experiencing art. This exhibition was on display at the New Museum of

Contemporary Art in New York from January 14 to February 28, 1978, and the paintings

exemplified a new outrageous outlook on what made a painting good or bad. A line from the

original press release reads, “In keeping with the museum’s policy of showing new and

provocative work by living artists from throughout the United States, ‘Bad’ Painting raises

several controversial issues about the nature and use of imagery in recent American art.” (Cain 1)

Our instinctive response of the term ‘bad painting’ would lead us to assume she is making a

negative statement about the artist’s ability to make work. We would normally associate this

term with poor technical skill and perhaps the inability to use materials effectively. The ‘bad’

Tucker is describing is a purposeful neglect of traditional painting and drawing methods. Most of

these figurative pieces ignore the laws of anatomy as well as logic of space. This can be seen in

American painter Charles Garabedian’s paintings that were on display at the 1978 exhibition. His

piece Jean Harlow (Fig 2) shows a naked female figure lying in an ambiguous outdoor scene.

This wouldn’t be considered a typical rendition of a female nude because there is nothing

particularly conventionally appealing or romantic about her like her disengaged facial expression

and the positioning of her lanky limbs

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Jean Harlow, Charles Garabedian, 1964, oil on canvas. 42 × 57 in. 106.7 × 144.8 cm. Fig 2.

If we compare Garabedian’s Jean Harlow to Titian’s Venus with an Organist and Cupid (Fig 3)

we can instantly see the differences in the women’s portrayal in regard to a “good” verses “bad”.

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Venus with an Organist and Cupid, Titian, c. 1550–1555. Fig 3.

Titian’s masterful paint handling exemplifies excellence in the technical skill dominate in this

time period. His nude figure is reclining gracefully upon delicately painted cloth and drapery and

is exposing her figure provocatively. Her ideal body type painted in a traditional painting

technique of the era is a complete opposite of Garabedian’s take on a similar subject matter

because there is less emphasis on norms of ‘beauty’ in Garabedian’s piece. His paint handling is

less technical and could even be described as anatomically incorrect and awkwardly painted.

However, by placing this nude figure in an open nature scene it still gives the painting’s subject a

provocative vulnerable presence like Titian.

When I start my paintings, I typically have a clear theme or situation I want to paint

about, which is usually inspired by reflections of past experiences or relationships. Virtually all

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my work in the latter half of my undergraduate career deals with subject matter about suffering,

discomfort, or anxiety. This type of subject matters allows my ‘bad painter’ approach to

figurative work to have a visual language that parallels the conceptual ideas. The element of

suffering is displayed physically in the handling of the paint, and my awkward mark-making

adds to this discomfort because of the painting’s imagery and content. In the press release for her

Bad Painting exhibition Tucker says, “The artists whose work will be shown have discarded

classical drawing modes in order to present a humorous, often sardonic, intensely personal view

of the world.” (Miller 1) As the creator, there is a feeling of freedom when I don’t have strict

obligations to depict imagery as it’s seen in the natural world or follows traditional rules of paint

application. This freedom opens me up to a more genuine and personal discovery process in the

work. During the initial stages of my painting process, I use rapid expressive mark-making to

block in the subjects of the painting. This usually starts with a milky, washed out paint mixture

for the initial layer to work from. The lack of saturation does not grant these initial marks with

much of a presence on the canvas, which makes it easier to cover and rework them further along

in the process. I develop the imagery in my work by working back and forth between moments

of control and chaos. This means that in certain areas of the piece I use thinned out wet paint

applied with quick gestural marks, and in others I use thicker paint and big blocky forms to

create visual contrast. The relationship in my work between subject matter and style of painting

compliment each other due to the “ugly” nature of both.

For my BFA Capstone exhibition Preying For a Miracle I analyzed the Biblical book of

Job found in the Old Testament in relation to my own life. My interest in the Book of Job stems

from a human desire to understand suffering, especially suffering that is unprovoked. At the

beginning of the book of Job, Job is described as “blameless and upright; he feared God and

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shunned evil”. (Job 1:1) As the first chapter of the book progresses, Satan comes to God and

presents a wager. Satan insinuates that Job is only faithful to God because God has “put a hedge

around him”. (Job 1:9) Satan proposes that he can make Job curse God’s name if he removes the

abundant blessings he has received. God accepts this wager and declares that as long as Job’s life

is spared Satan can do with him as he wants, which begins a series of brutal trials. I found myself

asking how can such violence and human suffering be justified?

The first painting in my body of work titled, Head to Toe (Fig 4), references Job 2:7. In

this passage Satan attacks Job’s physical body in the form of boils and sores shortly after killing

his family, servants, and livestock. In order to have a more personal and intimate relationship

with the story, I assumed the position of ‘Job the Sufferer’ and replaced the ashes that Job sat in

(Job 2:8) with symbols, shapes, and colors that I associate with my own family. I then articulated

a large exposed figure in front of a crowd of observers seen in the top left corner. The viewer

takes in the crowd watching the suffering man, becoming aware of their own presence as one

among the crowd of spectators. The central figure’s body was treated very violently with the

paint in order to build up a fleshy scab-like texture. The thick physical mark that is made by

applying paint with a pallet knife was utilized in this instance to show the horrific condition of

Job’s body. The area under the chin and on the leg below the tire was applied with the same

intent, but with a different method. I went to the waste bin in our painting studio where my peers

dump paint and other medium at the end of our studio time and harvested cans of the waste. I

then used my hand to very strategically and intimately spread the waste across the body of the

figure.

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Head to Toe, 2018, oil on canvas. 60” x 72” Fig 4.

The extreme physicality of the central figure is offset by the flat blocks of color that make up the

environment surrounding it, which creates visual diversity in paint handling. Head to Toe proved

to be a break-through piece at this juncture, and kickstarted interest in new directions in the

creation of this body of work in regard to typology. Typology can be briefly summed up as a

method of Biblical interpretation that suggest the Old Testament foreshadows the New

Testament. In Head to Toe, I depicted a suffering man being passively observed by a crowd. This

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scene could be seen to directly foreshadow the crucifixion and suffering of Jesus Christ in the

New Testament.

There are a few artists who influenced the composition and imagery in Head to Toe. One

being William Blake, the English poet, painter, and printmaker, who illustrated the Book of Job

in the early nineteenth century. Blake had an obsession with the story of Job, and revisited this

subject matter numerous times in his artistic career. of his pieces, Satan Smiting Job with Boils

(Fig 5), was particularly interesting to me because there is a similarity in its composition in

comparison to Head to Toe.

Satan Smiting Job with Boils, William Blake, c.1826, Fig 5. Head to Toe, 2018, oil on canvas. 60” x 72” Fig 4.

If you compare the figure of Job in Blake’s piece to the ‘Job’ in my own, you can see very

similar shapes and forms that are used to direct the viewers interaction with the pieces. Both of

the heads are tilted back with eyes that gaze into the upper right corner which creates an implied

line for the viewer. Once the viewer travels diagonally across the figure’s bodies, they meet a

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curving form that redirects them back into the canvas. In Blake’s Satan Smiting Job with Boils

the body of Job’s grieving wife stops the viewer’s eye from exiting the canvas at the lower left

corner and instead points them back towards the vertical figure in the middle. In Head to Toe the

man’s deformed foot is what keeps viewers engaged with the painting and directs them to the

crowd observing above. This comparison can be seen as a testament to the fact that for years

artists used similar tactics to take composition into consideration. In Blake’s piece Satan is

represented in human form, whereas in Head to Toe I have depicted him as a wolf blending into

the crowd. Dana Schutz’s piece Presentation was a painting I referenced during the creation of

Head to Toe. Schutz, an American painter based in New York. There is an obvious relationship

between the compositions of Presentation and Head to Toe, but I was mainly interested in her

treatment of the figures and the space they are placed in. In Presentation, Schutz does a

masterful job placing the figures into an atmosphere we can understand as viewers, thus allowing

us to enter this new realm of reality with the figures. I wanted Head to Toe to have this same sort

of specificity in atmosphere as well as specificity of the observing characters.

Presentation, Dana Schutz, oil on canvas, 2005 Head to Toe, 2018, oil on canvas. 60” x 72” Fig 4.

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In Presentation, each member of the crowd has their own personality and identity which

seperates them from the other figures. This gives the viewer a greater sense of ‘crowded-ness’

because we can focus in on each individual as their own person or being, and in Head to Toe I

wanted my sea of observers to have these same individual identites. Similar to Schutz’s crowd

the crowd in my painting is painted to each have different facial structures and expressions, but

unity in the way they are painted.

Can You Hook It, 2019, oil on canvas, 60” x 72” Fig 6.

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As I moved forward from the first piece, I found myself drawn to the notion of being

transformed as a result of suffering. I was thinking of specific relationships in my past where this

feeling of being trapped was heavy, so I began to paint these two figures who were made entirely

of rocks. These figures were back to back, and in some places their body parts, or the rock

chunks, become interchangeable. While studying Old Testament scripture, I was particularly

attracted to Job 41:2, where God uses this idea of the seas’ never-ending depth and the ghastly

sea monster the Leviathan to clarify to Job the difference between God and man. Inspired by this

humbling act of transformation despite suffering, Can You Hook It (Fig 6) became the second

piece in my series. When God says to Job that only He understands the depths of the sea, He is

placing Himself into a role that is superior and separate from humanity. This separation of

Heaven and Earth is shown in Can You Hook It by placing a lamb in the lower left corner of the

piece.

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Detail Fig 6.

The lamb serves three main purposes in the painting, the first being an example of the rejection

of space as we understand it. Just as Heaven and Earth are two places that don’t exist physically

together, the lamb interferes with our understanding of an ocean scene and ignores the rules of

the atmosphere. The second purpose of the lamb is as the manifestation of Christ in the piece.

Throughout the Old Testament if one wanted to be in the presence of God, one would have to

formally sacrifice an animal to invite God into the space. This practice changes in the New

Testament when Jesus Christ becomes the ultimate sacrifice, thus allowing man to call to God

freely without the ritual of animal sacrifice. The final purpose of the lamb is to balance the

painting compositionally and change the speed of the painting - the change of pace is achieved

by having a moment in the painting where the mark-making is slower, and the application of

paint is more intricate to counterbalance quick gestural marks.

The Sacrificial Lamb (Fig 7) by Portuguese artist Josefa de Ayala was used as my

inspiration for the lamb’s positioning and shape. I used this specific lamb as a reference in order

to indicate that the lamb in my piece held the same religious iconography as Ayala’s painting

from the 1670-1684 period.

The Sacrificial Lamb, Josefa de Ayala, 24” x 40”, Fig 7. Detail, Fig 6

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The lamb in Can You Hook It is a direct reference of Ayala’s piece, except for the exaggeration

of the size of the lamb’s head. The body language of both lambs conveys helplessness, and by

placing my lamb in the lower left corner with his back to the other characters I am increasing the

lamb’s vulnerability. Another way I indicate the lamb’s innocence was by placing it among

violent jutting grass. In Dana Schutz’s piece Dead Zebra (Fig 8), she depicts a deceased zebra in

the fetal position lying below ferocious vegetation. Schutz takes inspiration for this mark-making

from American painter Jasper Johns 1975 piece Untitled (Fig 9).

Jasper Johns, Untitled, 1975. Oil and encaustic on canvas, Fig 9.

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Even though these marks are nonrepresentational they have an aggressive feel to them, which in

turn makes the zebra seem that much more innocent. The grass in Can You Hook It serves this

same purpose.

Dead Zebra, Dana Schutz, oil on canvas, 2003 Fig 8. Detail, Can You Hook It, 2019, Fig 6

Christ portrayed as a suffering figure was my final piece for my BFA Capstone

exhibition. Crux of the Matter (Fig 10) differed from the two preceding works because I was no

longer replacing characters or symbols in the narrative with my own. In this piece I was focusing

on Christ in the moment of ultimate suffering as He hung on the cross and took His final breath.

Crux of the Matter was painted in a primarily blue and orange complementary color scheme in

order to create visual tension. The face of Christ is in anguish and his nailed hand is both tense

and defenseless all at once. His abdomen is falling out into the ground below Him, symbolizing

His blood being released into the world. The lilies that make up the blocky vegetation below the

figure reference the Virgin Mary because of their similar purity.

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Crux of the Matter was created as a response to ‘Job the Sufferer’ shown in Head to Toe. My

intention at this point in the show’s assembly was to have the three selected paintings be set up in

an altar-like fashion, specifically referencing the Monastery of St Catherine in Mount Sinai. In

this church there are painted panels that show Moses encountering God in two separate

instances, once through the burning bush, and once while receiving the Ten Commandments.

The transfiguration of Christ can be seen in between these pieces just below them. In my

arrangement I have the suffering Job of Head to Toe and the humbled Job of Can You Hook It.

The crucified Christ of Crux of the Matter hangs between them, just a few inches taller. This is

meant to be seen as a typological interpretation of the Book of Job in relation to the crucifixion

of Christ.

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Crux of the Matter, 72” x 36”, oil on canvas, Fig 10.

I chose the name Preying For a Miracle for my BFA exhibition as a play on the phrase

“praying for a miracle”. The desire for a miracle most likely means something is so beyond a

person’s control that it has led them to beg for a magical change in circumstances. At the

beginning of this process I was interested in the idea of suffering, and how suffering can be

horribly personal and widely universal all at the same time. It has always felt genuine to me to

paint about the ‘ugly’ things life has offered me and try to find the twisted beauty and humor in

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them. It feels like a splendid act of rebellion to openly face my suffering on an obnoxiously large

canvas. I can be bold and aggressive in mark-making and color, but also delicate and reserved.

Throughout the creation of these large figurative paintings I have developed a new relationship

with the anguish of suffering. Suffering is both my own worst enemy and my most valued muse.

As I move forward in my practice, I question if my “ugly” paint handling is only

appropriate because it parallels the nature of the subject. I plan on exploring the possibility of

more joyous content in similar painting methods, seeing if the expressive nature of the paint is

able to translate successfully.

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